“But he’s going to be so upset when there’s no guitar under the Christmas tree.”

“There’s a guitar waiting under the Christmas tree for him at home. He just has to wait a little longer to be surprised.”

She looked like she was in physical pain. Her son is only four months old, so she can’t imagine depriving him of anything.

But it was grueling. All day long in the days leading up to Christmas, we listened to variations on a theme:

“I hope Santa brings me a guitar.”

“I sure hope Santa got my letter.”

“If I don’t get a guitar, I’m going to be so mad at Eddie, because he made me tell him my Christmas wish. Now if I don’t get it, it will be his fault.” (????)

“You know what I’m really hoping for?”

“Do you think Santa will go to our house, too, or just Half Moon Bay?”

Aaaggghhhhh …..!

Sure enough, the minute we walked into my sister’s house on Christmas morning he did a quick examination of objects under the tree, and said, “There’s no guitar.”

Tense silence.

“Maybe Santa brought me a guitar at our house.”

Exhale.

Do you have any idea how glad I am that I bought him that thing?!?! What kind of Chinese water torture would it be to listen to him pine for it endlessly? Even if I had decided NOT to get him a guitar, I think by now I would have run out to buy one.

Apparently, the boy must make music. Who are we to stand in his way?

Additional gift news:

I’m all fancy with my new cell phone from DH. People tell me it’s a RAZR, and I have to believe them, even though it doesn’t say anywhere on it that it’s a RAZR. Ha! Mine isn’t pink, literaticat, but it’s slim and snooty and bursting with technical doohickeys. I can take photos with it. I just haven’t figured out how to send them to myself. For now, they are tiny pixel pictures. And I can AIM now! Um … once I figure that out, too. Yes, I have been studying the manual. No, I don’t always understand it.